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After big Colorado burns, homeowners, communities try to fire-proof

Homeowner Nancy Lee of Frisco, left, shows an installed sprinkler on top of a roof to Deputy Chief Jeff Berino of Lake Dillon Fire Station No. 2. Berino often works in Frisco's Bill's Ranch neighborhood, where residents won a "firewise" grant. (Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post)

FRISCO —Coloradans living in forests are trying to fireproof their communities as larger and hotter wildfires destroy more homes and firefighting costs grow intolerable.

Increasing numbers of burn-zone residents are finding they have little choice but to coexist with wildfire — part of the natural environment and crucial to keeping forests healthy.

County authorities and local fire chiefs are encouraging the shift toward greater self-protection, aided by the federally backed Fire Adapted Communities program.

Since 2002, wildfires have destroyed roughly 2,000 structures in Colorado, federal fire data show. The U.S. Forest Service already spends more than $2 billion a year nationwide trying to suppress wildfires, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said Friday.

Yet Colorado development that today covers 355 square miles of forest — with another 1,423 square miles of forest privately owned — is intensifying with population growth. In 2010, there were 556,000 homes in the wildfire "red zone," up from 464,000 in 2000.

State government officials for the most part have left it to counties and local fire chiefs to deal with the problem.

Yet proponents contend that better community self-protection will minimize destruction.

"If it is a big crowning fire, we know what could happen. But if it is a moderate fire, we will have a fair chance of surviving," said retiree Jim Lee, 69, who installed a rooftop sprinkler on his house in the woods near Frisco.

Lee also ripped cedar panels off the house and replaced them with nonflammable cement siding and switched roofing to fire-resistant shingles. He cleared a firebreak around the house, and got a special permit to thin dead pines 100 feet into the adjacent national forest.

Lake Dillon Fire Rescue District Deputy Chief Jeff Berino called Lee's home "incredibly well-defended" — the gold standard as Summit County girds against wildfires likely to ignite on 156,000 acres of beetle-killed forest.

Dealing with Colorado's wildfire problem more aggressively — by banning new building in burn zones — would probably be impossible, state natural resources officials say.

"It's extremely hard to say to an individual who has bought land in the mountains that they cannot build on it. They may even have a legal right to develop it," said Colorado Counties Inc. lobbyist Andy Karsian. "Development in the wildland-urban interface is going to happen. The question is how we find that balance between the personal responsibility for living in an area that will have fire and having good regulations."

Strategies evolving While fireproofing must not substitute for wise planning, it makes sense, said Scott Fitzwilliams, supervisor of the White River National Forest, which spans an area from Meeker to Breckenridge and is plagued by a beetle epidemic.

"More and more of the risk associated with wildland firefighting is in the protection of homes and other structures," Fitzwilliams said. "When we have these communities built right up against the National Forest boundary, we have a challenge to ensure we can manage or at least try to fight fire in a safe manner."

Strategies for dealing with wildfire risk have evolved.

After the Black Tiger fire burned 44 structures west of Boulder in 1989, fire ecologists called for clearing "defensible space" around houses. Most counties have implemented codes that require trimming trees and driveways wide enough for firefighting vehicles.

Now there's a growing emphasis on ensuring adequate water supplies, so that firefighters can try to neutralize embers rocketing out of wildfires. After the 2002 Hayman fire burned 132 homes and 466 outbuildings, hundreds of underground cisterns were installed in the foothills west of Denver, in Boulder County and near high-value homes in Eagle County.

County authorities and fire chiefs typically require people building new homes in forests far from municipal water to install a cistern or provide another water supply. (Since 2003, the state has issued 29 permits for firefighting-only wells.)

This year, Boulder County authorities also began requiring builders to install heat-activated indoor sprinklers. They also must install 3- to 5-foot- wide firebreaks covered by 1-inch-diameter stones around houses.

Some residents are given the option to work with local fire officials to help install community cisterns, which can cost up to $45,000 and store more than 20,000 gallons of water.

Contemporary code in the area requires new houses to have a cistern within 1,000 feet. However, 90 percent of homes in the burn areas were not near a cistern, Harvey said. Firefighters had to haul in water.

Summit County authorities this summer installed four cisterns to help protect high-value houses overlooking Breckenridge.

"A continuous water supply is best, but this is a very good alternative," Red White and Blue Fire Rescue Battalion Chief Dan Bergbauer said. "All the recent fires are telling us that preparation is key."

But fireproofing has limits.

Policy debate"We can make the mountains safe by paving them. That's not why we live in Colorado," state emergency management director Kevin Klein said. "What level of protection are we going to to be able to afford and still enjoy what makes many people want to live in Colorado? That's what policymakers are going to debate."

Klein serves on a state task force charged with recommending state-level action to help deal with building in burn zones.

Beyond fireproofing houses and towns, "we have to look at where we are allowing new development to occur," said Summit County Commissioner Dan Gibbs, who works as a wildland firefighter. "I don't want to be voting for new development in areas where I think there's going to be a major, catastrophic fire."

Dealing with existing development looms largely unaddressed. Fireproofing tens of thousands of homes in forests could cost homeowners millions. An indoor water sprinkler system or underground cistern can raise house-building costs by more than $10,000.

In Black Forest, chief Harvey said "it would be extremely unfair" to saddle residents who are rebuilding with tough new requirements. Low-cost measures, such as requiring metal mesh across attic vents to stop embers, seem reasonable, Harvey said.

"But we're not going to be as demanding on those who are rebuilding" because now that Black Forest has burned, "it's going to be a long time before there's truly a fire threat," he said. "We don't mandate sprinklers. We're not going to make them put in a new cistern."

Even as counties tighten fire codes, enforcement remains
"one of the shortcomings of our regulations," said Eagle County fire mitigation manager Eric Lovgren, who faced homeowners who broke out crying when he suggested removing beloved pines around decks.

Once county inspectors review fireproofing and sign off on a building permit, "we cannot issue a ticket" if requirements aren't met, Lovgren said.

Force of natureHowever, fire experts say the extent to which expanding forest communities can coexist with wildfire will depend on the raw force of nature.

Boulder County officials, analyzing data from the 2010 Fourmile Canyon fire that burned 169 of 474 homes in its path, have found that 83 percent of the homes where inspectors had done fireproofing reviews survived, compared with 63 percent of homes that were not inspected.

"All your preventative measures can be there and it is, honestly, still a 50-50 shot that your home will survive," Notbohm said. "Because of the existing conditions in Colorado — old housing stock, overgrown forests, inadequate water supply — it's likely we'll continue to see significant home loss."

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